KM asks: Okay, here goes. Do you consider Alfred Hitchcock a great man? See more.

Dear KM: Oh crudness, I cut and pasted from FB and lost the end of your questions or question. This vexes me greatly. I mean I might accidently give you good advice and then what would happen to my sacred rep? But I am nothing if not courageous, so here goes. You shouldn’t take my word for it. My opinion is only one opinion. It’s best to give the souls from the Great Beyond a chance to weigh in. Flip a coin. If it comes up heads, a dearly departed has voted yes. If it lands tails, then a spirit has said no. Don’t flip just a few times. That’s not statistically significant. Besides, there’s not a lot to do in the afterworld. So, just by asking the souls to vote, you’ll have brightened their lives (See what I did?) something considerable. I suggest flipping that coin at least 100,000 times.

************************

LF: How many ducks are in a row?

Dear LF: Go to the nearest pond with hundreds of ducks. Throw a piece of bread into the pond. Hurl the next piece near the shore. Toss the third bread cube on land. And so on, until you have hundreds of ravenous, fierce ducks snapping at your feet and heels in a crazed quest to get more food. Then simply turn around and herd them into a row. (You did watch Rawhide and Babe didn’t you?) Count quickly as ducks as notoriously impatient. Oh, and don’t forget to say please and thank you. As with all aquatic mammals, manners are important.

************************

DH asks: How do I keep my dog from rolling in dead possum?

Dear DH: Your dog clearly has a preferred scent. A refined one. So, if you want to keep your dog away from dead possums, you will have to spray that scent on something that you don’t want anymore like underwear with skid marks. Simply spray the “Dead Possum Scent” on the underwear. Kinda weird put at least arguably healthier that wallowing in dead possum. As of now, no major perfume company produces this scent. I suggest writing a certified, signature-required letter to the CEO of ChanelTM. They’ll be excited to hear from you.

Shred or grated the cheese, queso duro or cotija. Fry refried beans in pan using medium heat for 5 minutes. Stir occasionally. While beans fry, place a tortilla in another pan. Cook on medium heat for 30-to-40 seconds or until tortilla softens completely. Repeat for all tortillas.

1) The monastic followers of Pythagoras believed our souls entered Hades, the afterworld, through the stems of bean plants. Hades was the place where our souls found their new bodies, kinda like transferring data via a memory stick to a new laptop after the old one crashes.

2) So if you ate beans or even damaged them, you could have very well denied a soul access to the very bean roots it needed to get to Hades. No trip to Hades via healthy bean roots, no new body for the soul. No more soul would have meant complete oblivion for all time.

3) Which is a bummer.

4) So, Pythagoras’ followers held it was a sin to eat beans or even walk through bean fields.

5) If these people had been able to gain control of the governments of all the Greek city states, future cuisines would have been devastated. For example, what would Mexican food, one of the world’s great cuisines, be without beans? And what would life be without Beanie WeeneesTM?

6) Fortunately, the Greeks of the Classical Age were perpetually at war with each other and never had time to seriously debate the Pythagorians’ bean-route-to-Hades belief. However, Pythagoras’ theorem is still taught to eager legions of students who can go home and reenergize themselves with Beanee Weenees. Life is good.

– Chef Paul

My cookbook, Eat Me: 169 Fun Recipes From All Over the World, and novels are available in paperpack or Kindle on amazon.com